Is 2023 a leap year?

No, 2023 is not a leap year. A leap year has 366 days instead of the usual 365, and this extra day, February 29th, is added to the calendar to help synchronize it with the solar year. The solar year is approximately 365.2422 days long, and the concept of a leap year was introduced to account for this fractional day.

The rules for determining leap years are as follows:

If the year is divisible by 4, it is a leap year.

However, if the year is divisible by 100, it is not a leap year, unless it is also divisible by 400. In that case, it is a leap year.

Now, let's apply these rules to the year 2023:

1. Is 2023 divisible by 4? No, it's not, because 2023 ÷ 4 = 505.75, which is not a whole number.
2. Is 2023 divisible by 100? No, it's not, because 2023 ÷ 100 = 20.23, again not a whole number.
3. Is 2023 divisible by 400? No, it's not, because 2023 ÷ 400 = 5.0575, which is still not a whole number.

Since 2023 doesn't satisfy any of the conditions to be a leap year, it remains a regular year with 365 days. The next leap year after 2020 is 2024, which will have the extra day, February 29th.

In summary, 2023 is not a leap year because it doesn't meet the criteria of being divisible by 4, 100, or 400. This adherence to leap year rules helps ensure that our calendar stays reasonably synchronized with the Earth's orbit around the Sun, maintaining a consistent way of measuring time.